Goethe, Volume 9: Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship

An authoritative English translation of one of the most important works in the history of the novel

Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship (1795-1796), Goethe's second novel, is a foundational work in the history of the genre--perhaps the first Bildungsroman, a coming-of-age story focusing on the growth and self-realization of the main character. The story centers on Wilhelm, a young man living in the mid-1700s who strives to break free from the restrictive bourgeois world of his upbringing and seek fulfillment as an actor and playwright. Goethe's novel had a huge impact on the Romantics. Hegel, Schelling, Novalis, and Schopenhauer considered it one of the most important novels yet written. Schlegel famously called it one of the "three tendencies of the age," along with the French Revolution and the philosophy of Fichte. And Beethoven, Schubert, and Schumann composed songs to poems from the novel. It also had a major influence on nineteenth-century British writers, including Thomas Carlyle, who was its first English translator, and George Eliot. Drawn from Princeton's authoritative collected works of Goethe, this is the definitive English version of a landmark of world literature.

Author: Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: 04/23/1995
Pages: 396
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 1.40lbs
Size: 9.10h x 6.10w x 1.10d
ISBN: 9780691043449

About the Author
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) was one of the greatest artists of the German Romantic period. He was a poet, playwright, novelist, and natural philosopher.